Life plays a Note, and we dance to the rhythm; but the style we adopt in dancing to the notes played decide what side of life we end up. Writing brilliantly and profoundly about change, loss, companionship, and finding one’s way through the dark, the author cuts to the core of the contemporary experience. The stories in “The Notes They Played” are linked by a unity of theme and by precise, elegant verses that elevate everyday occurrences into short, perfectly rendered tales that resonate. Joiya Morrison-Efemini, with her precise, punchy verse, and a brilliant use of metaphor, in stories such as “The Piano”, “Our Drowning Gene”, “The Summer of the Four Humiliating T-Shirts”, writes with flat understatement about the struggles and disenchantment her protagonists face, and the effect of their choices. The unforgettable characters that populate the pages of “The Notes They Played” are vividly and lovingly infused with the author’s signature blend of exuberant prose, deep humanity, and stylistic story telling. Lyrical, elegant and moving, these stories cohere into a superb collection.

Purchase Link: 

https://a.co/d/0663dip6

In this Novel-in-Verse, tragedy uproots Iris and her sisters, all named after flowers, from the solid ground of middle-class life and plants them, unsupervised, in the rocky terrain of low-income housing. In a world where rain falls only on the privileged, Liam, a student who attends the elite private school directly across the street, proves refreshing as a summer gale, gushing joy into the sisters' lives. Further nurtured by Ma Moore, a church elder who sprinkles the Flower sisters with spiritual wisdom, Iris embraces her Heavenly Father with steadfast urgency.But when a student takes a hopeless leap from the school roof, Iris withers under the scorching realization that everything she thought she knew about privilege—and God—lies crippled. Petrified Flowers is the anthem of one African-American girl straddling three worlds. It is a song of hope, a triumph of faith, and a resounding refrain of the Father’s eternal love. 

Does God put discouragers in our path to create discomfort? Can the disquiet of not belonging be of Him, to spur us into forging ahead to places unknown? Can He use the illiterate to build empires? Can He restore broken hearts and enable forgiveness for the most crushing of transgressions? What could happen if we believed God was in the midst of it all?

Once upon a time, a simple girl and a simple boy fell in love. This was back in the time when marriage did not succumb to suffering or unkindness. It survived pride and envy. It was not expected to be perfect. It bore and believed and hoped and endured. The girl opened herself up to the boy and he propelled into her love. And they bound to one another and multiplied.

They fled from a world of hate and settled someplace safer. But evil found them. And they fell. They forget for just an instant, about love. They couldn't feel it, so they thought it was dead. They mistakenly understood it to be buried under the hate they'd tried to escape. It was still there. Merely disguised in pain and fear. The girl and the boy limped through life, defenseless. But He whispered...

This is their story...

Purchase Link:
https://a.co/d/0jk79CmS

Like carving stone, DARKER SISTER sculpts the experiences of one American woman into effigies impossible to forget. DARKER SISTER extracts the splinters left by second-class citizenship and whittles them down to righteous anger, tolerant teaching and, finally; miraculously, forgiveness. This collection displays on a mantle of faith the acceptance that racial restoration may not happen on this side of eternity. Still, it strives. Morrison-Efemini tells her children, "You can do hard things," so she expects her readers to as well - to identify whether they fit the descriptions. Challenging us all to find ourselves on the wrong side of the page and to flip ourselves over to the light.

Purchace link:
https://a.co/d/0b810QYG